Israel - Palestine Discussion | Post Respectfully | Discuss more, tweet less

[oates]

I assume the psyche of not wanting their neighbours to become powerful enough to cause them such suffering in the future has arrived from their past experiences in Europe and elsewhere where they suffered horrifically in the past. Basically hedging their bets just like Feroh did by killing babies and waging untold misery on those who supported Moses.

People are trying to make sense of this world where the abused become the abusers. It's almost impossible to understand the sickness that overcame a nation that could support so many atrocities and then see history being repeated. Victims thrown out of their businesses and homes in the dark of night, the terror of waking to being beaten and thrown out into the cold, which events are we talking about?

We say never again but the World stands by and watches without acting. Of course we don't want to use the same word, it's not that bad, not that wrong, not comparable yet.

How does a whole Nation gain that same psyche to denigrate and abuse, harm and kill a certain people? Because they are afraid, because it's what they know. All of them? No, just the powerful ones who lead, lie, use every tool at their disposal such as propaganda (heard that before?) to justify and sweep their nation into lockstep behind them.

Words are powerful. Some we shouldn't be using again hopefully..

 

[calodo2003]

Is there any literature I can get a hold of to better understand the conflict between Israel and Palestine? Feel wholly inadequate, so I'm just reading what others are saying and taking it as gospel at the minute.

Any videos or audiobooks or books would be very helpful.

Thank you.

There’s quite a few good, objective videos on YT if you search ‘Israel Palestine conflict.’

 

[Paxi]

There’s quite a few good, objective videos on YT if you search ‘Israel Palestine conflict.’

Thanks mate, I will do. Though I'm way too tender to do anything like that today.

 

[Gehrman]

There’s quite a few good, objective videos on YT if you search ‘Israel Palestine conflict.’

I'd like @2cents input on this.

 

[Roane]

Hamas was elected legimately almost immediately after Israel ceded Gaza and soon as possible started firing rockets into Israel. I doubt this is fact doesn't play into the Israeli psyche when it comes to giving concessions.

Thats a but selective isn't it? Hamas from it's creation in 1989 engaged in retaliatory attacks and military targets only.

Hamas didn't target civilians until after the Ibrahimi mosque massacre in 1994.

I think even Israeli commentators have agreed with this. One Israeli expert on Hamas wrote a piece that said that Hamas had a charter that didn't allow them to carry out certain types of strikes. The 1994 attack "freed" them from this.

When Hamas won their elections the curfews, sanctions and other such means increased because (like Morsi in Egypt) their winning wasn't acceptable to some

 

[2cents]

However, there is a certain question to be asked on how a group who endured one of the greatest tragedies in modern history can be so bereft of empathy and morality when it comes to the Palestinians.

I would say it's more the fact that people are in disbelief that a group, who suffered so much from an event like the Holocaust, can impart any form of suffering equivalent to what is going on in Israel/Palestine

I don’t think it’s up to us to determine what the moral lesson of the Holocaust should be for its victims, and then decide that some are unworthy or need asking “certain questions” on the basis that they have failed to live up to what our expectations might be. Many Jews will have concluded that the true lesson is that only with a state and the ability to defend themselves can they prevent it happening again. Many will have determined that murderous antisemitism is a simple fact of life in this world and there’s feck all they can do about it. Many will have drawn more general conclusions regarding the nature of racism, war, and genocide in the world (“never again”). Many may be suffering from too much multi-generational trauma to draw any clear conclusions at all. Jews can and do debate these questions among themselves, sometimes rather viciously. But it’s not something which should determine how the rest of us approach the moral questions raised by this conflict, whatever our personal beliefs. If Israeli Jews are committing crimes against the Palestinians, it is enough to recognize that fact without assigning them a special moral status based on their horrific history.

 

[Amir]

@Amir - how are you? Hope you’re safe. Is there any opposition to what the Israelis are doing from the left within Israel? Not so much from any political figures but more the people.

The left is mostly silent nowadays. I think it's mostly because Israel tends to be awfully militarist and turn right on days like that. You won't be able to change anything. All you'll get is abuse.

Personally I'm fine. I live quite far from the Gaza strip so most rockets don't reach my area. The poor sods who live around the strip are the ones regularly bombarded (not to mention those in it...).

 

[2cents]

Is there any literature I can get a hold of to better understand the conflict between Israel and Palestine? Feel wholly inadequate, so I'm just reading what others are saying and taking it as gospel at the minute.

Any videos or audiobooks or books would be very helpful.

Thank you.

I'd like @2cents input on this.

I have posted these earlier. I think @entropy also recommended James Gelvin’s book - I haven’t read it myself but have read other stuff by him and he’s excellent (look for his lectures on YouTube).

I can recommend dozens covering most specific topics, but these are typically the type I’d recommend to anyone properly approaching the topic for the first time:

I think as a general history, Righteous Victims by Benny Morris (published just before his infamous political turn to the right) manages to hit the right notes.

The next two are a bit more scholarly:

On the development of Zionist thought, The Making of Modern Zionism by Shlomo Avineri guides the reader through the various forms Zionism took in its early years. The introduction stands alone as a really good explanation for the appeal of Zionism to late 19th/early 20th Jews.

Palestinian Identity by Rashid Khalidi is probably the most authoritative work on the development of Palestinian National consciousness.

Two good memoirs to consider from either side - Once Upon a Country by Sari Nusseibeh and A Tale of Love and Darkness by Amos Oz.

Two explicitly partisan explanations of each sides’ respective narrative - The Question of Palestine by Edward Said and Right to Exist by Yaacov Lozowick.

Just discovered Rashid Khalidi’s The Iron Cage is readily available (pdf) with a quick google search. It’s a good historical account of the Palestinian side of things.

 

[Gehrman]

Thats a but selective isn't it? Hamas from it's creation in 1989 engaged in retaliatory attacks and military targets only.

Hamas didn't target civilians until after the Ibrahimi mosque massacre in 1994.

I think even Israeli commentators have agreed with this. One Israeli expert on Hamas wrote a piece that said that Hamas had a charter that didn't allow them to carry out certain types of strikes. The 1994 attack "freed" them from this.

When Hamas won their elections the curfews, sanctions and other such means increased because (like Morsi in Egypt) their winning wasn't acceptable to some

Well 5 years isn't much.

Could you give me a link to this, not because I doubt it, but because i'd like to read it.

 

[adexkola]

Do the Israelis have a right to fight back?

No. They have the right to end apartheid, and find a way of restoring a viable two state solution, or integrating the Palestinians into their society with all the full rights currently available to Jewish citizens.

The Afrikaner regime did not have a right to oppress the majority black population in SA, and they did not have a right to "fight back" when the oppressed became violent.

 

[jeff_goldblum]

@2cents has put it far better in an earlier post, but what is happening now to Palestinians bears very little resemblance to the events of the Holocaust. Given that there are plenty of more apt historical comparisons available (none of which are particularly complimentary to the Israeli government), the speed at which some jump straight to the Nazis and the Holocaust appears, at best, ignorant, lazy and insensitive.

If you are someone who wants to support Palestinians and argue their case convincingly, I can't think of a worse way to do that than to invoke the most traumatic event in Jewish history as a 'gotcha' against the Israeli government.

 

[Paxi]

I have posted these earlier. I think @entropy also recommended James Gelvin’s book - I haven’t read it myself but have read other stuff by him and he’s excellent (look for his lectures on YouTube).

thanks ill check these out for sure.

 

[Roane]

Well 5 years isn't much.

Could you give me a link to this, not because I doubt it, but because i'd like to read it.

The name is Matti Steinberg, previously a Shin Bet advisor and asbi said expert on Hamas.

 

[Andycoleno9]

Yeah but anti-zionism isn't anti-semitism. Yeah but yeah but yeah but.

Yeah, those 10 idiots justify throwing bombs on babies.

 

[oneniltothearsenal]

Hamas was elected legimately almost immediately after Israel ceded Gaza and soon as possible started firing rockets into Israel. I doubt this is fact doesn't play into the Israeli psyche when it comes to giving concessions.

Even if you argue that Egypt is there to protect Israel's interests, the facts are that this blockade started when, and in response to, Hamas's take over of power in Gaza. Hamas is clearly a big problem here.

Anyone that has a problem with Hamas should absolutely abhor Netanyahu and the Israeli far-right of Likud.

Netanyahu and his buddies on the far-right groomed and funneled money into Hamas top usurp power from the PLO in the late 1990s because they wanted power and they couldn't have a more moderate PLO making peace with the Labor faction of Rabin-Peres and other moderates. None of the stuff that happened would have been possible if it wasn't for Netanyahu, Likud and the far-right in Israeli.

In the 1990s we were really close to avoiding things like this entire set of atrocities. So if you don't like Hamas, you should do everything you can to oppose and speak out against Netanyaho and all his Likud hardliner allies.

"At the time, political hard-liners had branded Rabin a traitor and some extremists called for his death.
In one notorious incident, Netanyahu, then opposition leader, addressed a protest in downtown Jerusalem where demonstrators held posters portraying Rabin in an Arab headscarf and Nazi uniform." source

If you don't like Hamas then you need to start blaming the guy who decided to start another series of fighting just to avoid his damn corruption charges. And if you don't like Holocaust comparisons then you should hate the current Israeli government because they used the same comparisons to devalue and undermine Rabin and Peres and the moderates.

 

[Roane]

@2cents has put it far better in an earlier post, but what is happening now to Palestinians bears very little resemblance to the events of the Holocaust. Given that there are plenty of more apt historical comparisons available (none of which are particularly complimentary to the Israeli government), the speed at which some jump straight to the Nazis and the Holocaust appears, at best, ignorant, lazy and insensitive.

If you are someone who wants to support Palestinians and argue their case convincingly, I can't think of a worse way to do that than to invoke the most traumatic event in Jewish history as a 'gotcha' against the Israeli government.

I've said much on this issue earlier and won't repeat that.

However I dont agree with some of the sentiments you put forward. For me it's inevitable when a victim becomes an oppressor to ask how they could do what they are doing having been on the other side.

I wouldn't necessarily use it myself, and I take the point some do it as a "dig" but ultimately I'm not surprised when the question/point is made.

 

[The Original]

No. They have the right to end apartheid, and find a way of restoring a viable two state solution, or integrating the Palestinians into their society with all the full rights currently available to Jewish citizens.

The Afrikaner regime did not have a right to oppress the majority black population in SA, and they did not have a right to "fight back" when the oppressed became violent.

That makes no sense. The right to fight back has nothing to do with the moral justification of your position. When what you have said is considered in the context of the conflict, you are right now suggesting that Israel should submit its citizens to be pounded by rockets until it amends its policies to end apartheid as you put it. This is manifestly unreasonable.

There is no basis, except in your having a right to an opinion, to state that the right to defense is vitiated by prior misconduct.

 

[VorZakone]

Well 5 years isn't much.

Could you give me a link to this, not because I doubt it, but because i'd like to read it.

Impact of the Hebron massacre
The Hebron massacre had a profound effect on Hamas' militancy. For its first seven years, it attacked only what it saw as "legitimate military targets," Israeli soldiers and military installations.[77] But following the massacre, it felt that it no longer had to distinguish between military and civilian targets. The leader of the Muslim Brotherhood in the West Bank, Sheikh Ahmed Haj Ali, later argued that "had there not been the 1994 Ibrahimi Mosque massacre, there would have been no suicide bombings." Al-Rantisi in an interview in 1998 stated that the suicide attacks "began after the massacre committed by the terrorist Baruch Goldstein and intensified after the assassination of Yahya Ayyash."[171] Musa Abu Marzouk put the blame for the escalation on the Israelis: "We were against targeting civilians ... After the Hebron massacre we determined that it was time to kill Israel's civilians ... we offered to stop if Israel would, but they rejected that offer."[172]

According to Matti Steinberg, former advisor to Shin Bet and one of Israel's leading experts on Hamas, the massacre laid to rest an internal debate within Hamas on the usefulness of indiscriminate violence: "In the Hamas writings there is an explicit prohibition against indiscriminate harm to helpless people. The massacre at the mosque released them from this taboo and introduced a dimension of measure for measure, based on citations from the Koran."[142]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamas

 

[Roane]

Well 5 years isn't much.

Could you give me a link to this, not because I doubt it, but because i'd like to read it.

The 5 years thing isn't accurate either as Hamas became elected in 2006

 

[The Original]

Anyone that has a problem with Hamas should absolutely abhor Netanyahu and the Israeli far-right of Likud.

Netanyahu and his buddies on the far-right groomed and funneled money into Hamas top usurp power from the PLO in the late 1990s because they wanted power and they couldn't have a more moderate PLO making peace with the Labor faction of Rabin-Peres and other moderates. None of the stuff that happened would have been possible if it wasn't for Netanyahu, Likud and the far-right in Israeli.

In the 1990s we were really close to avoiding things like this entire set of atrocities. So if you don't like Hamas, you should do everything you can to oppose and speak out against Netanyaho and all his Likud hardliner allies.

"At the time, political hard-liners had branded Rabin a traitor and some extremists called for his death.
In one notorious incident, Netanyahu, then opposition leader, addressed a protest in downtown Jerusalem where demonstrators held posters portraying Rabin in an Arab headscarf and Nazi uniform." source

If you don't like Hamas then you need to start blaming the guy who decided to start another series of fighting just to avoid his damn corruption charges.

I agree that Netanyahu is an issue. In all my posts, I have mentioned that the policy of expansionism (his policy of expansionism) must be reigned in. It is also obvious that at the end of all this, there is only one winner: Netanyahu.

 

[adexkola]

That makes no sense. The right to fight back has nothing to do with the moral justification of your position. When what you have said is considered in the context of the conflict, you are right now suggesting that Israel should submit its citizens to be pounded by rockets until it amends its policies to end apartheid as you put it. This is manifestly unreasonable.

There is no basis, except in your having a right to an opinion, to state that the right to defense is vitiated by prior misconduct.

Of course there is

Israel has a right to protect it's citizens (which conveniently exclude the folk in Gaza and the West Bank, but you know this). It does not have a right to fight back by pummelling buildings in occupied territory, subjecting the occupants to more economic misery. The onus should be on Israel to end apartheid as soon as is humanely possible. Once they regain the moral upper ground, then they'd have a right to fight back. As of now, they don't.

 

[berbatrick]

Just bollox.

The entire Palestinian cause was founded to commit another Jewish holocaust, where the Egyptians, Syrians, Jordanians had failed through conventional war. Thats why the first Jewish massacre happened in 1922...by the Palestinian Arabs.

Hamas are far more honest about this then you'll ever be.

@2cents you have been policing that word in this thread quite a lot, both long before and also after this post. Since you haven't responded to this one, I assume it is part of what you said below?

I don’t think it’s up to us to determine what the moral lesson of the Holocaust should be for its victims, and then decide that some are unworthy or need asking “certain questions” on the basis that they have failed to live up to what our expectations might be. Many Jews will have concluded that the true lesson is that only with a state and the ability to defend themselves can they prevent it happening again. Many will have determined that murderous antisemitism is a simple fact of life in this world and there’s feck all they can do about it. Many will have drawn more general conclusions regarding the nature of racism, war, and genocide in the world (“never again”). Many may be suffering from too much multi-generational trauma to draw any clear conclusions at all. Jews can and do debate these questions among themselves, sometimes rather viciously. But it’s not something which should determine how the rest of us approach the moral questions raised by this conflict, whatever our personal beliefs. If Israeli Jews are committing crimes against the Palestinians, it is enough to recognize that fact without assigning them a special moral status based on their horrific history.

Does this (bolded) square with the previous post (again, bolded bit?

Rather, it’s an attempt to appropriate the moral legitimacy they believe Israel has derived from the Holocaust and confer it on to the Palestinians, re-cast now not only as victims of Zionism, but also of the Nazis and their greatest crime. In doing so, they diminish the exceptional nature of the Holocaust and the pity that its Jewish victims (who had nothing to do with Israel’s crimes) might be expected to receive. That many do this unwittingly - in contrast to those who are just blatantly attempting to troll Jews - does not negate its impact in this. Nor does the fact many some Jews themselves often invoke the analogy.

In the bolded sentence, aren't you imposing your personal belief on what comparison (made by Jewish people) can be accepted in the wider discourse?

I personally do not think it is comparable, I think it is a needlessly provocative comparison, and a lazy/ignorant one* at best. I used this personal belief to avoid posting similar comparisons I did see online, made by Jewish, on explicitly those terms.**


* which is why I can see myself making it 10 years ago

**FWIW - because of my background, the obvious comparison for the events within Israel was to Indian communal riots with famous examples being Mumbai in 1992-93 and Gujarat of 2002, but on a scale more similar to this. The events in Jerusalem as a mix of the Golden Temple in 1984, and Babri Masjid in 1989 and 92. And for the situation as a whole, Kashmir has many parallels.

 

[adexkola]

I agree that Netanyahu is an issue. In all my posts, I have mentioned that the policy of expansionism (his policy of expansionism) must be reigned in. It is also obvious that at the end of all this, there is only one winner: Netanyahu.

You mean land theft, right?

Because terms like this ignore the reality of the "expansionism" happening at the expense of another group's rights.

 

[Gehrman]

The name is Matti Steinberg, previously a Shin Bet advisor and asbi said expert on Hamas.

Considering that by the time they were elected in 2006 doesn't it actually matter though how they were known at that time and what was in their charter(like calling for the murder of jews citing religious scripture, holocaust denial, wildly anti-semitic conspiracy theories). There had already been serious terror attacks world wide from palestinian terror groups long before Hamas, is it very relevant that it tooks them 5 years to adopt those tactics)

 

[The Original]

Of course there is

Israel has a right to protect it's citizens. It does not have a right to fight back by pummelling buildings in occupied territory, subjecting the occupants to more economic misery. The onus should be on Israel to end apartheid as soon as is humanely possible. Once they regain the moral upper ground, then they'd have a right to fight back. As of now, they don't.

How do you propose they go about said defense of its citizens?

 

[The Original]

You mean land theft, right?

Because terms like this ignore the reality of the "expansionism" happening at the expense of another group's rights.

I have used other terms in previous posts so not an issue for me.

 

[calodo2003]

I had never known or I had forgotten about the advent of Hamas, that it was aided through the more hardline faction of the Israeli government.

It seems to have been one of the most impactful ‘false flag’ operations ever conducted in that region (a loose interpretation of a ‘false flag’ operation, but many characteristics fit).

 

[oates]

@2cents has put it far better in an earlier post, but what is happening now to Palestinians bears very little resemblance to the events of the Holocaust. Given that there are plenty of more apt historical comparisons available (none of which are particularly complimentary to the Israeli government), the speed at which some jump straight to the Nazis and the Holocaust appears, at best, ignorant, lazy and insensitive.

If you are someone who wants to support Palestinians and argue their case convincingly, I can't think of a worse way to do that than to invoke the most traumatic event in Jewish history as a 'gotcha' against the Israeli government.

You can't see any parallels in behaviour and events?

 

[Paxi]

 

[Roane]

I have been careful to separate two issues. One is Israeli treatment of ordinary Palestinians, and the second is the conduct of hostilities with Hamas.

Clearly, there are areas where the international community needs to step in and reign Israel in, particularly with respect to the expansion of settlements. I was clear on this.

The second issue has to do with the current hostilities and the outcry on that basis. Hamas is primarily responsible for the deaths of innocent ones by the manner in which it chooses to fight. Its tactics are a complete violation of International humanitarian law both in respect of its own people and the Jewish civilian population that it targets.

Conflating these two issues and finding sympathy for Hamas because of Israel's maltreatment of Palestinians makes the issues impossible to solve.

Even if you argue that Egypt is there to protect Israel's interests, the facts are that this blockade started when, and in response to, Hamas's take over of power in Gaza. Hamas is clearly a big problem here.

Again I think there is a narrative presented that isn't backed up.

Creation of Hamas with help from Israel is or shouldn't be disputed. Even leading Israeli figures have said as much.

As I highlighted earlier Israeli figures also have said Hamas didn't target civilians and had this as part of their charter. It was Israeli attacks on civilians that "freed" them from that charter.

It's also been made clear that Israel always had the notion of taking as much land as possible oncebig became a force, the quotes of Ben Gurion are real and say as much.

I hate Hamas. However the constant bringing it back to "oh but Hamas" when Israel is the obvious perpetrator in situations is tedious and a load of BS.

 

[adexkola]

How do you propose they go about said defense of its citizens?

Iron Dome up.

The reality is that right now, Israel can do whatever the feck it wants to. It doesn't mean they have the "right" to. The principle of self-defense doesn't apply here, the same way I don't have the right to claim self-defense after goading and prodding a dog to snap at me, at which point I shoot the dog between the eyes.

 

[adexkola]

I have used other terms in previous posts so not an issue for me.

Fair enough

 

[Roane]

Considering that by the time they were elected in 2006 doesn't it actually matter though how they were known at that time and what was in their charter(like calling for the murder of jews citing religious scripture, holocaust denial, wildly anti-semitic conspiracy theories). There had already been serious terror attacks world wide from palestinian terror groups long before Hamas, is it very relevant that it tooks them 5 years to adopt those tactics)

This is the narrative that always gets presented on CNN and BBC. Who started the current issue? Yet the focus is on Hamas firing rockets. Do we start the discussion on Hamas retaliation or what caused the retaliation?

Hamas didn't start in 2006. They came about as a concept in around 1987, formed by 1989. Their formation and initial recourse is important to understand current affairs.

Their charter and offer to shimon Perez are vital to understand their position on Israel.

The scripture point is important too, as the charter was based on scripture to not attack civilians. It's also why they were "freed" from that charter as the same scripture allows for certain methods if done into you. In this case the Hebron attack on muslims.

As I said I'm no fan of Hamas but if we are to make accusations then let's look at them properly and see what was the causation, on both sides.

 

[The Original]

Again I think there is a narrative presented that isn't backed up.

Creation of Hamas with help from Israel is or shouldn't be disputed. Even leading Israeli figures have said as much.

As I highlighted earlier Israeli figures also have said Hamas didn't target civilians and had this as part of their charter. It was Israeli attacks on civilians that "freed" them from that charter.

It's also been made clear that Israel always had the notion of taking as much land as possible oncebig became a force, the quotes of Ben Gurion are real and say as much.

I hate Hamas. However the constant bringing it back to "oh but Hamas" when Israel is the obvious perpetrator in situations is tedious and a load of BS.

There are a couple of half-truths and misrepresentations here. The first one is that Israel took an active role in creating Hamas when in reality, what happened was Israel passively allowing for a change of power to protect its interests. I can't see anything wrong with Israel preferring one enemy over another. This may have been a miscalculation but above and beyond, even if Israel created Hamas entirely, what would this contribute to the present discussion where Hamas is intent on destroying Israel? Are you suggesting that Hamas is working for Israel? Are you suggestion that earlier inaction precludes a right to act now? I don't quite get this point.

Secondly, when you say it was the Israeli attacks on civilians that freed Hamas, you are making it seem as if the incident you referenced (earlier in the thread) was carried out by the Israeli State. In reality, it was carried out by one individual who was immediately killed in revenge and for which Israel banned his political party and condemned his actions. How could that be any form of justification for Hamas then adopting a position which is a clear violation of International Law?

I have only mentioned hamas in the context of the ongoing hostilities, so how do you defend a statement that Israel is the clear perpetrator? Who launched the first strikes? Who hides among civilians to launch rockets? Who exclusively and deliberately attacks civilians? What exactly absolves hamas of all these international crimes in your book?

 

[Spoony]

It's mental...an atomic super power versus stone chuckers. It's not even a conflict between two sovereign nations. How can any sane person get their head around that. And you can label it what you want...but it's a situation that'll only get worse. Realpolitik eh? Sod morals and doing the right thing. Anyway at least social media can't be deleted...I guess.

 

[Adisa]

That video in Finchley makes me so angry. Apart from the disgusting racism, it just takes the discussion from the legitimate grievance people have with the oppression of Palestinians.

 

[The Original]

Iron Dome up.

The reality is that right now, Israel can do whatever the feck it wants to. It doesn't mean they have the "right" to. The principle of self-defense doesn't apply here, the same way I don't have the right to claim self-defense after goading and prodding a dog to snap at me, at which point I shoot the dog between the eyes.

The iron dome isn't completely foolproof. You would be suggesting that losing 2 or 3 of your citizens every other day is an okay price to pay. That business activity cannot go on, and that your people cannot sleep. The iron dome is also extremely expensive to operate, making it a short-term solution. What government is going to accept these conditions?

I recognize that this is the reality and even worse for the people of Gaza, but this is down to Hamas. If Hamas fires rockets from genuine military locations, then every civilian on either side is safe.

Meanwhile, there are other more legitimate means of compelling Israel to do the right things.

 

[oates]

Meanwhile, there are other more legitimate means of compelling Israel to do the right things.

I'm interested.

 

[The Original]

I'm interested.

The international community must act. Hamas must be replaced by the Palestinian authority or other civilian/non-terrorist group so that Palestinian voices may have a meaningful voice at the diplomatic table.

With Hamas out of the picture, Egypt can open it's borders and Israel has no excuse for keeping up the blockade, making it harder for the USA to unconditionally support them. Hamas must go.

 

[Spoony]

The international community must act. Hamas must he tepla

Public??!!